Most overrated and underrated political philosophers?

[John Dule]

Overrated:

- I'll have to agree with others here who said Locke. He has always struck me as an unforgivable hypocrite, and the writings of his that I've read are a real slog to get through. I read Locke immediately after having experienced the joy that is Thomas Hobbes, a philosopher who bases each and every one of his conclusions in rigorous definitions and realistic analyses of human motivations. To read Locke after that was truly disheartening, seeing as so much of his discourse is grounded in nothing more than personal opinion.

- Marx has had a debilitating effect on the left, as others here have said, because so many people these days spend their time attempting to defend every little claim he made rather than developing theory of their own. Look guys, the man wrote thousands upon thousands of pages of dense economic and social theorizing-- he was bound to make a few mistakes. The labor theory of value and surplus value are both absolutely wrong, and socialists these days would do well to detach themselves from these outdated theories from this sad old man who they've allowed to define their entire movement.

- Plato. Perhaps not overrated (it's impossible to overstate his influence on philosophy), but certainly under-critiqued.

- Camus. I read The Stranger but found myself pining for the prose of Ayn Rand the entire time. If you want to write fiction that has philosophical themes, at least make that philosophy interesting.



Underrated:

- Freud. Most people know him as "That guy who was obsessed with penises," but he actually wrote several great pieces on political and social psychology that have seriously shaped my worldview. "Group Psychology and the Analysis of the Ego" in particular is a masterful study of crowd dynamics. He draws a series of deep connections between democratic impulses and mob mentality that only become more relevant every year these days. My favorite quote: "By the mere fact that he forms part of an organized group, a man descends several rungs in the ladder of civilization."

- Thomas Hobbes had a mind capable of nearly unimpeachable logic. Regardless of his conclusions, the way he went about searching for the truth speaks to me on a profound level. I think far too many people dismiss him due to his endorsement of absolute monarchy, and in doing so, they unknowingly lose the opportunity to experience philosophical inquiry at its most objective and unbiased.

- Gustave le Bon: "The masses have never thirsted after truth. They turn aside from evidence that is not to their taste, preferring to deify error, if error seduce them. Whoever can supply them with illusions is easily their master; whoever attempts to destroy their illusions is always their victim."

[John Dule]

Overrated: Jacques Rosseau

Yes. I considered including him but I felt sick to my stomach at the prospect of writing anything substantial about this lunatic.

[John Dule]

Foucault was a lunatic with extremely distasteful politics and moral attitudes, but his strange, addled brain did produce on occasion some very important insights that, most probably, would not have occurred to anyone else. Where a lot of academics go wrong is to try to use him as a substitute for the fallen Marx; as a man who created and propagated a total system of thought that can be usefully applied to any possible scholarly problem.

Just out of curiosity, how does applying Foucaultvian thought to any scholarly problem work?

Just say that everything is a prison. That about covers it.

[John Dule]

Foucault was a lunatic with extremely distasteful politics and moral attitudes, but his strange, addled brain did produce on occasion some very important insights that, most probably, would not have occurred to anyone else. Where a lot of academics go wrong is to try to use him as a substitute for the fallen Marx; as a man who created and propagated a total system of thought that can be usefully applied to any possible scholarly problem.

Just out of curiosity, how does applying Foucaultvian thought to any scholarly problem work?

At best, impenetrable word-salads. At worst... an example of that disturbing phenomenon when 'Theory' is placed into an intellectual ecosystem it does not belong in and functions like an invasive species.

The single worst grade I've ever gotten on an academic paper was also the only time I've ever cited Foucault. It was so uncharacteristically bad and so incomprehensible, even to me after I'd written it!, that my professor gave me a mulligan and told me I had a week to rewrite it from top to bottom. The rewritten version was Foucault-less and got an A-.

If memory serves, the paper was meant to prove that there should be gay rights in Japan or something, a subject that my professor, correctly, had faith that I was more than capable of discussing without recourse to The History of Sexuality or whatever it was I made the mistake of citing. In my defense, I was nineteen years old at the time.

I once went to a seminar on Foucault's "dispositif" at Berkeley. It might be the only lecture I've ever come close to falling asleep in.

[John Dule]

In no small part because he thought it would help create a more open society. The lecture was explicitly about fusing Marxist and Foucauldian thought on neoliberalism though, so that might explain the hostility towards neoliberalism that isn't directly from Foucault.

On the subject of underrated political philosophers, I think Machiavelli is also not given his due. He's frequently discussed, but the depth and importance of his work is never really fully appreciated. He was, after all, a republican who was cited by the Founders from time to time and had a great influence of Thomas Hobbes. Most people would just tell you he was a scheming evil mastermind, but he was a serious thinker who deserves more mainstream study when it comes to discussions of republicanism.

Made this in my first semester at Cal:



(I do love Machiavelli though)

[John Dule]

talking of overrated French philosphers: Voltaire. dear god.

Candide is brilliant.